NEW YORK _ Punch Spencer Dinwiddie's All-Star ballot immediately.
After hanging 41 points in a loss to the Spurs Thursday, Dinwiddie torched the Hawks for 39 points in a 122-112 win for the Nets on Saturday. He has scored at least 24 points in nine of Brooklyn's last 10 games and is averaging 25.3 points per game _ good for ninth-best in the NBA _ since Kyrie Irving's last game on Nov. 14.
That, of course, is the question this team has been faced with for more than a month: How would they stay afloat without Irving and Caris LeVert, their two best playmakers in the starting lineup?
So far, the Nets have done it by riding one spectacular Dinwiddie performance after another. They've also carved out an identity as a gritty team that can get stops on the defensive end.
Brooklyn needed to be that team on Saturday night. The Hawks jumped out to an early 14-5 lead then held that momentum all the way through the third quarter, where Atlanta built an 18-point lead at the 7:16 mark. Trae Young was on his way to 47 points, and Alex Len had 23 points off the bench, yet another example of a stretch five killing the Nets this year.
Then the Nets came alive, as they do so often. They outscored the Hawks 37-14 in the fourth quarter. Dinwiddie picked up his third, fourth and fifth fouls in the third quarter then re-entered with 10:28 to go in the fourth. He scored 16 points in that time span.
The Nets also enjoyed a dominant type of night from DeAndre Jordan, who finished with 12 points, 20 rebounds and six assists. (That's the first time a Net has posted that stat line off the bench, and only the third time in NBA history.)
He also brought the house down with a one-handed alley-oop finish on a Dinwiddie lob pass.
Garrett Temple stepped up for 13 of his 25 points in the third period, keeping the team alive while Dinwiddie was on the bench in foul trouble.
But they never should have been in danger in the first place. The Hawks entered Brooklyn with a 6-23 record, one of the worst in all of the NBA. The Nets needed Dinwiddie's heroics to beat an Eastern Conference bottom-feeder at home. It happens sometimes, but it was an unsettling sight for this Brooklyn defense.
The Nets let the Hawks run up 73 points in the first half and 98 through the first three. They were dead in the water, until they turned their defense on.
Brooklyn continues to find ways to win despite their injury woes. It was only supposed to be Kevin Durant out for the season. Instead, the injury bug bit not just Irving and LeVert, but also David Nwaba, who the team has credited for their defensive resurgence.
Nwaba is now out with a torn Achilles, and the Nets defense looked out of whack for three quarters without his presence.
Brooklyn enters the holiday season on a high note with this victory. They have four days off, then play the Knicks on Dec. 26. After that, they'll need to get much tighter on defense than they were against the Hawks.
